1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a portable terminal, and more particularly, to a cradle used to cradle the portable terminal on a substantially flat support surface, such as a table, etc.
2. Description of the Related Art
Portable terminal refers in general to an apparatus which, while carried by a user, provides a function of communication with another user or a base station. As the mobile communication technologies and information communication industry develops, the scope of services provided by the portable terminal has been rapidly expanded. For example, initial mobile communication services which had been limited to partner call, voice communication, etc., are now expanding to a moving image service, various ring tones, games, mobile banking, and so forth, and are rapidly expanding in popularity from young people to old people.
Such portable terminals include removable or built-in battery packets for supplying power during portable movement, and generally include separate charging cradles. A removable battery pack is generally separated from the portable terminal when it is to be charged on the charging cradle or the portable terminal including the removable battery pack is charged on when the portable terminal is placed on the charging cradle. Furthermore, the portable terminal including the built-in battery pack may be charged on a separate cradle for the portable terminal or it may be directly connected to a charging cable through an interface connector.
More recently, as the demand for multimedia services provided through portable terminals is increasing, and the power of portable terminals approaches the performance of a Personal Computer (PC), more generalized computer products such as a smart phone or a tablet PC, have emerged and various additional devices for extending the functions of the portable terminals have been proposed. For example, a cradle such as a docking station having a speaker device embedded therein may constitute a compact audio device by being coupled with a portable terminal. A tablet PC may extend an input device by being coupled with a keyboard of a docking type. When such a cradle is structured, a weighting member may be disposed in the cradle to stably maintain a cradling state/orientation. That is, when the portable terminal is mounted on the cradle, the height of the center of gravity of the cradle/portable terminal combination is increased due to the added weight of the portable terminal, thereby decreasing the stability of the combination. Accordingly, by using the weighting member, the change of the center of gravity of the cradle caused by the weight of the portable terminal is minimized.
FIGS. 1 and 2 are views for describing a cradle 10 for a portable terminal 19 according to a prior art embodiment. FIG. 1 shows a case member 11 of the cradle 10, and FIG. 2 shows a state in which the portable terminal 19 is mounted on the cradle 10. The case member 11 is in a pyramidal shape having an open surface on which the portable terminal 19 is mounted. A weighting member 15 is installed on an inner side of a bottom surface of the case member 11 so as to more securely hold the case member 10 in a stable manner on a flat plane such as a table, etc. The open surface of the case member 11 is closed by a front case 13, and the portable terminal 19 is mounted substantially on the front case 13.
Unless the weighting member 15 is installed, when the portable terminal 19 is mounted on the cradle 10, the center of gravity of the cradle 10 shifts (that is, it increases) so as to be substantially close to the center of gravity of the portable terminal 19. As a result, when the portable terminal 19 is mounted longitudinally (that is, its longer dimension is mounted vertically with respect to the flat plane) as shown in FIG. 2, the cradle 10 is likely to move easily, making it difficult to maintain a stable cradling state. On the other hand, the cradle 10 having the weighting member 15 installed therein can maintain a stable cradling state even when the portable terminal 19 is mounted longitudinally. Thus, due to the installation of the weighting member 15, the center of gravity of the cradle 10 can be maintained close to its bottom surface regardless of whether the portable terminal 19 is cradled on the cradle 10 or not.
To watch a moving image or video broadcast using the portable terminal 19, a user usually puts a side of the cradle 10 on a table as shown in FIG. 3. In this state, the center of gravity of the cradle 10 is still maintained close to the bottom surface of the cradle 10 (due to the fixed position of weighting member 15), yet the bottom surface is no longer positioned on the table and instead it is a side of the cradle 10. As a result, it is difficult to stably maintain a landscape (widthwise) view mode when the weighting member 15 is located at a fixed position on the bottom surface of the cradle 10.